You know you're the mother of a toddler when....

--You feel you're throwing away more food than your child eats (unless you eat the scraps)

--You've become so blase about freakouts that your motto is "Another day, another tantrum"

--Naptime is indeed the new happy hour

--You often think Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde had nothing on your child

--This morning's perfect hair twist is this afternoon's tangled, loose, ratty knot

--You hear "NO!" so much that you are thinking of teaching your child a different language altogether. Maybe Russian. Does nyet sound better than no?

What else would you add?!

Don't raise your voice and other advice moms ignore

In a mom group I'm in, a while back we were discussing a book about parenting. The book suggested that when your child has a tantrum, you speak in a quiet voice and tell your child he has the option of calming down or going to his room.

I laughed at this advice and told everyone in the group that my wailing, thrashing son would never hear me if I spoke in a quiet voice. I told them I would have to yell to be heard above him.

One of the moms said when she speaks in a soft voice, her children get quiet so they can hear her. Another mom seconded this approach and said raising your voice only makes your child want to get louder. Both of these women have children who are three years old and up, so they have the language skills that my not-yet-two-year-old does.

But anyway, I left that day feeling guilty and like a mean mom who yells at her kid.

This week, though, I happened to talk to one of those women on the phone and was surprised when I heard her tell her child, "Knock it off!"

So, ha!

What a relief to know not every mom can live by her own advice all the time....

It's a man ... it's a dad ... it's SAHD!

I met an interesting creature today. I've heard of them before but never met one in person. They have been glamorized and yet also sometimes been the subject of suspicion. I'm talking about:

The stay-at-home dad!

Able to get up with the baby in the middle of the night, do the laundry and fix the dishwasher (or so I've been told). Happy to heft a 40-pound child up his shoulders, run to the store for those three things that annoyingly got left off the shopping list and open every stubborn jar in the kitchen. Willing to lift the couch to find a lost binky, give the dog a bath and rub the wife's feet when she comes home from work! A Renaissance man of many talents!

And you know what, he seemed like a perfect normal, average, nice guy.

A regular dad.

SAHD dude, slow down -- you're making us SAHMs look bad....